New Prisons needed ?

A huge prison needs to be built on that Thornton Hall site, which was acquired by the State years ago for the purpose of building a prison.

The State has more than enough money rolling around right now to get this done.

Then move all the prisoners from Mountjoy off to Thornton Hall, demolish Mountjoy, and build housing on the prime land in Dublin 7 that is walking distance from the city centre and served by various modes of public transport.

Simon Harris just said in a statement... too many people are being sent to prison.

I did work on that with the ESB years ago. Huge amount of money already spent on it. Needs to be finished.

Government probably afraid of how much it'll cost them to finish. 😂

We absolutely need more prison space and have them located outside of the city and suburbs, but with good road connection. That Thornton Hall Site looks to be in the right area. We should built for capacity well above what we need, so we don't have scummers and scrotes with dozens and hundreds of convictions with no jail time. I would be in favour of a huge site out near Mullingar to cover the the long term, serious offenders. A smaller, prison maybe on the TH site which could double up and have a separate wing for young offenders.

A little OT, but would there be any appetite for small sentences with no conviction recorded? It could cover the minor, non-serious offense categories. Use for sentences of less than 30 days. Could be a great lesson and shock to the system for some people and wouldn't leave the stain of a criminal record.

it just sounds good to him, there is no reason or logic to it really.

people often suggest the state should build certain things or relocate certain services to the most random places without thinking as to whether it is workable or not, or about the fact that there is a reason certain services were never based in those areas in the first place.

I would suggest it's not a waste of money if it makes society a safer place to be. The current system where criminals with hundreds of convictions walking the streets, committing crimes daily is not the way things should be for the excuse of a lack of space.

There are people who are convicted and jailed for not paying their TV license. Do they really need to have a record, or might it be better in these cases to have the threat of jail, but without ruining their lives and job prospects over one of the pettiest offenses on the books?

Why would building a large prison in Mullingar be stupid? Attaching them to cities seems stupid to me, as the costs sky-rocket and space is at a premium. Building in or near somewhere like Mullingar might not be what you think is the best idea, but stupid?

What would make it unviable exactly? It has excellent bus and rail links to most other parts of the country, not to mention the motorway network. Prisoners don't need to use their Leap Card while they are incarcerated and only the staff and prisoner transport services need to be considered. It's just as favourable as the Midlands Prison in Portlaoise and could replace, or re-purpose the Midlands Prison if a large prison was built in, or near Mullingar.

Having small prisons scattered all over the country is what is unviable, as they cost more to run per cell/prisoner than a properly designed, modern, secure and large prison.

@quitelife's post didn't quote for some reason but to answer your question.

spike island was difficult to work and more resource intensive then other prisons apparently, at least that is what i heard anyway.

it had no more of a deterrent effect then other prisons i would expect.

it's never going to reopen as a prison no matter how much some want it, it is now doing reasonably well as a tourist attraction.

because small jail terms for such offenses not only don't work as a deterrent but would just cost to much when there are cheap alternatives available.

+ in a small country it would eventually get out that the individuals were in prison anyway so it's pointless and pissing money down the drain given that not having a criminal record yet jailing individuals anyway wouldn't remove the issue of those individuals finding it hard to get employment anyway.

we already have multiple prisons so building the prisons near the cities and replacing the likes of mount joy and all of the older prisons which are life expired won't cost any more then currently.

building it in mullingar would cost more because extra infrastructure would have to be built, + staff would have to come further to get to their job so harder to get staff.

We will never get a prison built with the Greens in power. And the Greens are effectively in power in this country single-handedly.

We will only get a prison built if and when we get a political party into power which does not slavishly follow the woke agenda, which basically paints criminals as victims of their backgrounds rather than as adult humans with free will. And SF are most certainly not the asnwer to that - half of their councillors should probably be in a prison right now.

For the last time, yes.